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Yeah, "Alliance to Restore the Republic" is the formal name of the Rebel Alliance, just as "Confederacy of Independent Systems" is the formal name of the Separatists. Generally in an article that mentions those subjects, you use the formal name in its first mention in the body of the article, and then the informal names for other mentions.

 

Is this an issue at all?

 

It is long winded and annoying. I know what the Alliance was I don't need the legal name for it! Seems pointless and annoying.

 

There is no "obligation" whatsoever to use the full name all the time. When I write articles, I tend to use it once, then switch to "the Alliance" in the rest of the article.

 

Same.

 

brb, have some edits to make to Alek Squinquargesimus

 

LelalMekha - Good call on your recent contribution to the Kylo Ren page. Pity they didn't call him Jason, so we could have had Jason (non-canon) vs Jacen (non-canon).

 

They might as well have. Every time someone says "Ben" it takes me out of the film, no joke. His name is "incorrect," which I could live with, but even worse, it's the name of a different SkySolo who doesn't even exist now.

Having invested my youth and teenagehood in YJK/NJO, if Harrison Ford had yelled "Jacen" instead, I would have broken down before the scene even got going.

 

I have to admit, coming from a similar background I have no idea where you're coming from. The part of the EU Jacen Solo's history who Ben Solo most parallels is the absolute worst thing ever done to the character, and among the worst done by the EU to anyone period. Speaking for myself, I find Kylo Ren infinitely preferable to Darth Caedus just on the basis that he was actually created as a villain from the start - but if they'd had his real name be "Jacen", it would have seriously rubbed me the wrong way.

I suppose it would improve slightly if they eventually had him get the redemption that was gratuitously denied EU Jacen, but it would still leave a bad taste in my mouth.

 

I mean, TFA's already basically a LOTF redux on that point. Love it or hate it, it is what is. And since Jacen's already been ruined as the Solo kid who goes evil, it's kind of a weird missed opportunity to play on all sides for maximum drama and sad feels. Plus they not only tossed Ben Skywalker as Luke's kid but kinda like...reverse tainted him by giving the new evil not!Jacen his name. It's just weird.

 

^ This exactly. I loathe what they did to Jacen, but that ship sailed thrice, in terms of happening in the first place and then getting rebooted away and finally redone as TFA, so at that point why not double down?

Thinking objectively about storytelling is one thing, and experiencing a movie you've been waiting twenty years for is another. Hearing the name from Ford's mouth onscreen in a "real" Episode (capping Jacen's career in the most "legitimate" way we are ever going to get) and strongly suspecting what was about to happen, would have sidestepped all my intellectual objections and gone straight to my feels.

 

But the thing is, Kylo Ren isn't Jacen Solo, and he's not Darth Caedus either. Jacen was a hero. Caedus was a hero derailed into a villain for like no reason. Kylo Ren is a villain. Even just in purely immediate emotive terms, I don't think it would have drawn a positive reaction from me to explicitly connect them.

 

Kylo/Ben doesn't have Caedus's Denning-didn't-understand-Traitor baggage, but he's still Evil Solo Son. And in a world where we're not even getting Jacen at all, good or bad, I don't know if I'd have a "positive" reaction exactly if Han yelled Jacen instead of Ben, but it absolutely would've been more "Son of a bitch, they really did it..." instead of "Wait...Ben? What? Ew."

 

Jacen was only Evil Solo Son for like a tenth of his existence. The other nine-tenths he had literally nothing in common with Kylo personality-wise. Considering we so universally roll our eyes at Darth Caedus around here, it seems unfair to Jacen's character boil all of it down to just that story.

 

True. I mean, you're not wrong, it's just...it was weird that they actually went full Evil Solo Son as the major plot point, but didn't give him the "obvious" Jacen name after everything. /shrug

Tbh, I'm probably more upset they stole away good-guy Ben's name for Kylo during the reboot. It's like a ******, decade-later aftershock of the original Jacen-to-Caedus derailment. Somehow Ben *did* end up the evil apprentice after all.

 

I'm gonna do a Twitter poll on this; I'm honestly curious how common that reaction is among EU people.

 

Calling him Jacen or Jason also would have only appealed to the tiniest of fractions of the moviegoing audience, whereas anyone who has seen Star Wars before can understand the significance of a Skywalker/Solo child being named Ben.

Ben Kenobi is the one who brought Leia, Han, and Luke together. Ben Solo is the one who tore them apart. There's much more emotional nuance to the name Ben.

Throw Jacen/Jason in there and that emotional nuance is only going to be understood by a small segment of people. Which is ultimately the core of why the movie did not follow the EU continuity.

 

If you discount the healthy portion with no opinion, almost a quarter of my respondents are saying "more favorable", which is a strong minority if still a minority. But you're certainly right that the portion of moviegoers who would care is pretty small to begin with--then drilling down to a quarter of that portion leaves you with not a lot of people. So it's subjective, naturally (see also: the thumbs-up), but it definitely looks like they made the right call in terms of how EU people were going to feel about it.

I suppose it remains possible that a lot of people would've felt even better with a new name rather than Ben, though.

 

Sure, though that means that they're making movie decisions based on EU considerations, and I'd rather they make movie decisions based on movie considerations.

 

In that case, I would rather not have more films, because I care too much about both in order to have one take precedence over the other.

 

Fair enough. I disagree but personal preferences can't really be argued!

 

I had to do a fair bit of work to work through my sadness and let go of the canonicity of the EU before I went to see TFA so that I could give it a fair shot on its own terms. Because of that, I'm actually kind of in favour of changing the name - it's another marker of distance and difference. A remix, and one where I'll look forward to seeing what things are brought back either explicitly or via allusion, but...something different. Naming him Ben and giving him a story that nods towards Jacen references two parts of the EU while still doing something slightly different, and I actually find that helps me embrace and approach what we have now as something new. And like...to let go, I guess.

 

Question, for anyone in general: do you think that the son of Han and Leia falling to the dark side was an intentional nod to the EU? Or, when some of you say "nod" and "reference," do you mean that in a less intentional sense?

I don't think it was a deliberate nod to the EU. I'm sure they were aware of the similarity, but - and this is by no means meant to be disrespectful to anyone's feelings towards the EU - the Jacen Solo/Darth Caedus storyline isn't exactly the most original concept in the world. Someone from the next generation of Skywalkers/Solos turning to the dark side seems like a natural story development, to the point that I'd say of course the films and the EU both ended up doing it.

 

They couldn't think of anything better to do, not that I think that was in anyway a positive decision.

 

Which is why it's so odd to me to see people suggest that it makes Ben and Jacen basically the same character.